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The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
41–50 of 542 posts
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#42Would an implosion of Uber be the first step of the end of this tech bubble?
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'll be really interested in seeing what happens if Uber can't recover from the burn rate and make a sustainable business without self driving. I can see in the best possible scenario we end up with more cities like Austin, Texas that have their own nonprofit ride sharing app. I actually have huge respect for what Austin did in banning Uber and Lyft and making their own app (Ride Austin) that isn't designed to make i…
Clearing up some serious misconceptions here: 1) Austin did not ban Uber or Lyft. The city council passed an ordinance that required a gradually increasing percentage of rideshare drivers pass an FBI-approved fingerprint background check. (These rules are in place in other locales in which Uber operates, such as NYC and Houston.) Uber and Lyft formed a PAC that got a proposition on the next local election ballot that…
Yep I wasn't clear. Austin banned some of the wild west behavior of Uber and Lyft, and they refused to follow along with reasonable restrictions and decided to protest by leaving Austin.
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#44What is the possibility of criminal charges being brought forth if it's determined that Kalanick actively conspired with Lewandowski?
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#45Yeah, this is a big deal. Uber has gambled everything on self-driving cars, what with their absurd burn rate and all. If that gets shut down because of trade secret injunctions, I don't think they have time to pivot to another strategy, especially after their reputation has nosedived.
I'll be really interested in seeing what happens if Uber can't recover from the burn rate and make a sustainable business without self driving. I can see in the best possible scenario we end up with more cities like Austin, Texas that have their own nonprofit ride sharing app. I actually have huge respect for what Austin did in banning Uber and Lyft and making their own app (Ride Austin) that isn't designed to make i…
Kind of like how banning competition through taxi medallions are great because instead of investors and owners becoming rich, it just benefit drivers and riders.
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#46I actually think this might be a blessing in disguise for Uber. I always argued self-driving cars would destroy Uber should Apple or Google want to enter this space.
Why? Because self-driving cars are basically a fleet service driven by a software. Once you remove the driver (where Uber spent so much acquiring) The only differentiator is the consumer facing experience. Neither Uber or Lyft will have as much power as Apple and Google since they ultimately own the mobile experience.
I ultimately envision this business as kind of a Kayak mobile on the phone managed by Siri or Google/Apple maps that will call the nearest taxi or the cheaper rate aggregating from multiple possible vendors. Larger fleets (Uber, Apple, Google) to smaller individually manage fleets. Car companies might decide to also enter that market in collaboration with financial underwriter.
So having a network of drivers ultimately gives Uber some leverage and removing them from the equation, I think it'll actually destroy Uber. This is why I think, this could be a blessing in disguise.
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#47>Uber passengers only pay 41% of the cost of trips, with investor capital making up the difference.
Holy hell. That's not exactly a sound business model.
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#48I actually think this might be a blessing in disguise for Uber. I always argued self-driving cars would destroy Uber should Apple or Google want to enter this space. Why? Because self-driving cars are basically a fleet service driven by a software. Once you remove the driver (where Uber spent so much acquiring) The only differentiator is the consumer facing experience. Neither Uber or Lyft will have as much power as…
The drivers are going to be removed from the equation no matter what though.
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#49>Uber passengers only pay 41% of the cost of trips, with investor capital making up the difference. Holy hell. That's not exactly a sound business model.
That 41% assertion is wrong: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13861267
Re: The Uber Bombshell About to Drop
#50Yeah, this is a big deal. Uber has gambled everything on self-driving cars, what with their absurd burn rate and all. If that gets shut down because of trade secret injunctions, I don't think they have time to pivot to another strategy, especially after their reputation has nosedived.
It was a stupid moonshot play. They should have just focused on being a really good taxi company.
A taxi company isn't a unicorn.
A taxi company has well understood financials and valuation and would never be given a crack at VC Lotto.
In addition, the kind of quality control that Uber/Lyft exert over drivers almost certainly places the drivers in the position of being employees which makes things even more unprofitable.